Twelve civilians were killed and 18 were wounded when NATO-led forces carried out an air strike on suspected Taliban militants in Kapisa province on Saturday, according to provincial officials.

President Hamid Karzai has ordered an investigation.

The issue of civilian casualties has led to a rift between Afghanistan and its Western allies with President Karzai saying on Sunday that foreign air strikes had only succeeded in killing ordinary Afghans and would not defeat the insurgency.

If Hamid Karzai continues with home truths like this, then he should be careful that George W. Bush/NATO will not depose him in a bloodless coup; or in a bloody coup, like happened to South Vietnam‘s puppet president Ngo Dinh Diem, murdered by the CIA in 1963; in order to replace Karzai with, say, United States citizen Khalilzad.

The linked call was passed on to the Anti-imperialist Camp by the underground revolutionary anti-imperialist movement in Afghanistan which is participating in the popular resistance movement against the U.S.-led Western occupation. It was smuggled out from Policharkhi which even according to CNN “is the most notorious prison in Afghanistan” (Feb 26, 2006).

The Western installed regime together with the occupation forces keep an unknown number of political prisoners belonging to the various trends of the resistance. Most of them originate from the Islamic movement but some also belong to the leftist movement. One should not forget that under the new “democratic” regime affiliation to a communist organization is threatened by capital punishment.

We are supporting the demands of the Afghan political prisoners and will keep reporting about their protests.

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“Restore Afghan sovereignty”

Interview with Norman Paech, international spokesman of the parliamentary fraction of the German party “Die Linke” (The Left) and professor emeritus for law in Hamburg.

Q: In the West the military presence in Afghanistan is commonly justified under the rubric of the “war on terror” or even as a mission to “export democracy”. What mainstream politicians and commentators in West describe as terrorism is for most Afghans legitimate resistance against foreign occupation. What is your view?

It is obvious that all the talk we hear of democracy and human rights is void and serves as nothing more than a pretext to further strategic and economic interests in the region – i.e., the control of the raw materials needed to fuel Western economies. Afghanistan itself is crucial mainly for transit of petroleum and natural gas from the rich deposits of Central Asia. It also has strategic political importance with regard to the relationship of the two nuclear powers of the subcontinent, India and Pakistan. It is not about “nation building” and “good governance”. This is a lie. What we have in truth is an imperial protectorate.

Q: So do you consider resistance legitimate?

Resistance against foreign occupation in Iraq or Afghanistan is legitimate as long as it limits itself to military targets and refrains from deliberately attacking civilians. In this sense I would like to make it clear that we distance ourselves from the cruel methods of the Taliban.